From: John Vandenberg <jayvdb(a)gmail.com>
Was: Re: [Foundation-l] Friendliness
(was: Missing Wikipedians: An Essay)
Was: Re: [Foundation-l] Friendliness
On Sat, Feb 26, 2011 at 10:17 AM, Ryan Kaldari <rkaldari(a)wikimedia.org>
wrote:
On 2/25/11 3:11 PM, John Vandenberg wrote:
> On Fri, Feb 25, 2011 at 11:18 PM, <dex2000(a)pc.dk>
wrote:
>> ..
>> I think it could also be considered to divide
our huge language wikis
>> into smaller parts. The existing
WikiProjects
could be made virtual wikis
>> with their own admins, recent changes
etc.
That way, each project is in
>> fact like a small wiki to which the
newbie
could sign up according to
>> 'hers' area of interest and where
the clarrity
and friendlier atmosphere
> of
the smaller wikis could prevail.
This is the best solution, in my opinion.
Yes, the larger wikis need to become
WikiProject-centric. First step in
doing this would be to create a WikiProject
namespace.
Second step would
be to make WikiProject article tagging/assessment
part
of the software
instead of template-based.
I can see how those would be useful steps, however I think
those steps
are part of a 10 year plan.
A 10 year plan will be overrun by events.
We need a much more direct plan.
I recommend breaking enWP apart by finding easy chunks and
moving them
to a separate instance, and having readonly copies on the
main project
like we do for File: pages from Commons.
IMO, the simplest and most useful set of articles to break
apart is BLPs.
The criteria is really simple, and those articles already
have lots of
policy differences around them.
By the time we have perfected this system with the BLPs,
the community
will have come to understand the costs/benefits of moving
other
clusters of articles to separate projects, and we'll see
other
clusters of articles migrated to sub-projects.
btw, this idea is not new, but maybe its time has come.
http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=29729
--
John Vandenberg
Rather than breaking the project up, one way to achieve the same thing
would
be to apply a type of protection to BLPs that restricts BLP editing to
users who have a "BLP flag" set on their account. Having that flag would be
like having a user right, a privilege that can be earned or lost, for
example by adding unsourced negative material to a BLP.
In terms of administration, you could create a noticeboard where
non-policy-
compliant edits are reported, along with an elected BLP committee that can
remove the flag from an account for a certain time period, just like arbcom
does desysops today. I guess the rules would need to be applied leniently
at
first, to allow newbies to learn, and to avoid excessive drama. Perhaps a
three-strikes-and-you're-out system might work to address good-faith errors
(edits that are correctly sourced but constitute undue weight, etc.).
One thing is certain: reducing the number of people able to edit BLPs would
make BLPs a lot more stable, and less likely to contain libel or vandalism.
It would reduce the amount of real-life drama for BLP subjects and OTRS
volunteers - see
while probably increasing the amount of drama inside Wikipedia. That's a
problem, but in the end, if you think about it, the concerns of BLP
subjects
should take precedence over community concerns. It's just a question of
being responsible about things; losing the BLP flag doesn't ruin anyone's
life, whereas losing the ability to travel because of what a Wikipedia
article
says about you does.
Not sure how you'd handle the ability of newbie accounts to create BLPs. It
would be invidious for a new account to be able to create a poorly sourced
but good-faith BLP, and then not be able to correct a typo once it's been
categorised as a BLP.
Thoughts?
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